Running Experience 4: Preparing for my First Full Marathon

Hi Friends,

Greetings!

It has been my privilege to write and share my experiences related to long distance running. But I am writing this post after eight months. The reasons are many - I found a new passion of writing sports articles for an online portal and off late I am finding lesser leisure time because of both my professional and personal commitments. But I sincerely apologize for not holding on to the continuity, mainly for those reader friends who wanted to read my experience of first marathon. Without any further delay, let me recollect my preparations of my first Full Marathon (FM).

Prelude

It was somewhere in June 2015, my marriage got fixed. The wedding was decided to be held in mid of December 2015. During that time when my marriage talks were coming to conclusion, I received  through social media the itinerary for both Celebration Mysore Run 2015 and Kaveri Trail Marathon 2015. They were scheduled on Sep 6 and Sep 20 respectively. I thought I had three solid months to prepare and I should give a go for a FM before marriage because I was not sure about the continuation of my running passion because of changing equations post wedding.  

Confidence Builders

I started planning on my own. Trust me, there was no scientific method applied to my planning. My first step was to test my endurance. In the last weekend of June 2015 I planned to run on both Saturday and Sunday. It was a while, may be couple of months, since I was away from long distance running. Saturday June 27th early morning I started my first practice run. The day's target was to run beyond 8 km. But I could stretch till 10.2 km in 70 minutes without any problem. My plan was to repeat the same on Sunday morning as well. On Sunday, it was really challenging to keep both my body and motivation levels running. But I could live up-to the challenge and completed 10.48 km in 70 minutes. These two runs acted as my confidence boosters and in a way gave a kick start for my marathon campaign. 

Method for Madness

My next task was to plan for the forthcoming three months. I kept the plan simple - run 4-5 km on synthetic track as a daily routine and go for a long run on one day during weekends (Saturday or Sunday). I didn't have to bother about my practice venue. My workplace, Infosys Mysore DC owns a  sprawling campus of 400 acres full of greenery and neatly laid roads. One can easily get a continuous non-repetitive running route of 10-12 km. The non-polluted environment, safe and non-interfering roads of the campus provide a perfect setup for a long distance runner who needn't bother about anything other than running. 

For the rest of my article, I am going to focus more about the practice runs I did during weekends more than my daily routine runs. I started with 11 km on the weekend of July 4-5. The initial plan in my mind was to increase 2 km with every weekend run.  By July 18, I was able to run 15.26 km at a stretch. I became more ambitious for the next weekend and thought of trying out a Half Marathon (HM) i.e. 21 km. 

A sudden increase of 6 km posed a huge challenge for me both physically and mentally. Though I had the experience of running two HMs but they were in events where there were co-runners, water points and aid stations. But during practice I had to run alone arranging my own hydration. By that time, I had identified a non-repetitive route in my campus measuring around 12 km. Also I had got used to running holding a water bottle with capacity 600 ml. 

On July 25th, as planned, I started before 7 am and kept on running listening to FM radio. I found good rhythm during the run, didn't get fatigue even after passing 15 km mark. I completed 21.3 km in 2 hours 18 minutes with the pace of six and half minutes per km. I could say this was my "Doosra Padaav" (Padaav is the term used in popular game show Kaun Banega Crorepati meaning a major milestone) of my practice ("Pehla Padaav" or first milestone being the twin runs of June 27-28 mentioned earlier). 

Out of Comfort Zone

The next step of practice was to go beyond 21 km which was an unknown zone for me that time. I took break on the first weekend of August as I visited my hometown to meet my parents. Next weekend, i.e. on Aug 9th I did 15 km. Since I had taken a break, I didn't want to push hard immediately. But I planned longer runs for the next two weekends. As planned, on Aug 16th I raised the bar and ran 22 km in two an half hours. Next weekend i.e. on Aug 22nd I increased the distance by one more km and took 2 hours 40 minutes. 

After every long run I used to observe my body for a complete day. I used to note the slight changes in my body and how my body was recovering from the tiredness. After both of those runs, I could observe that my body was stable without any signs of injuries. It was enough to prove that my level of endurance and level of confidence as well were on incremental graph. 

The weekend of Aug 29-30, I visited my sister's place near Bangalore. Luckily, the place where she stays has a sprawling campus as well. I found a good route there as well for running. On Aug 30, I ran nearly 18 km and didn't stretch more than that as I had to travel back to Mysore on the same day.  

The next Sunday i.e. September 6 was the day of annual Celebration Mysore Run. No prizes for guessing, I had registered for HM :). Previous night it rained heavily in Mysore and a tree fell down on the route of Kukkarahalli Lake forcing the organizers to cut down the route by 2.5 km! Nevertheless I did well to finish within top 75 and earned myself a Finisher T-Shirt which was my first genuine prize for running in any serious competition. 

After running HM in Celebration Mysore Run 2015 on September 6, 2015

Practice at its peak

The weekend of Sep 12-13 was very crucial for me as it was the last weekend before the grand finale. I chose Sep 12 for my final practice weekend run and set the target of either 25 km distance or 3 hour running time whichever happens next. This time I found company in my friends Shailesh and Sakshum. They were practicing for Spirit of Wipro which was scheduled on Sep 20 itself (I had registered for that as well as a Plan B :) just in case my Full Marathon plan didn't materialize). 

As planned I was in campus by 6:15 AM. My plan was to run in campus for two loops on the identified route of nearly 12 km. Since Sakshum and Shailesh were practicing for 10 km, it was decided they would be giving me company for either of the loops based on their arrivals. I started with Shailesh at 6:30 AM and ran at comfortable pace for the first loop. Once we completed the first loop at the athletic track Sakshum was ready and he gave me company for next 10 km. 

Because of their company, the tiredness didn't creep into my mind. I completed 25 km with 7 more minutes to go for the other target of 3 hours. By that time I had completed both the loops and had entered the athletic track. Running two more rounds on the track became really tough for me as the fatigue was catching up. But I stretched on and stopped exactly at 9:30 AM and my Runkeeper app recorded 26.06 km. It was the longest in terms of distance as well as time I had run till that date. 

Shailesh and Sakshum (from extreme left in the same order)
gave me good company during my final practice run

I did some stretching exercises before all three of us sat down to relax. We started analyzing my run that day. We were just extrapolating based on that day's practice, how much time I might be taking to complete the FM. After getting to know about the cut-off time of 7 hours, Sakshum in jest commented that if I could repeat that day's three hour performance on the race day, I would be completing the race comfortably even if I just kept on moving my body. 

We all laughed and moved towards floating restaurant for breakfast (Floating restaurant is a special food court in our campus where unlimited breakfast/lunch/dinner is served. It had become a ritual for me to have a sumptuous breakfast after each weekend practice run). For the rest of the day I kept on observing my body and I felt it stable with little pain in my legs, ankles and feet. 

Following table gives the details of my practice runs:

Source: ASICS Runkeeper app which I use during practice runs.

The Sep 12 run had given me enough confidence to go for the finale. With that practice I was confident enough to run 26 km without stopping. But there was one thing going on in my mind - What after 26 km? How I should be planning for the last 16 km? 

I brought this up during a lunch time discussion with my friend Ravi Kirana. Though he had stopped running for the past 4 years, he came up with a suggestion. He told me why couldn't I try doing run-walk sequences. He told - after 26 km, I should try running X number of minutes as per my energy levels and walk next X minutes and keep repeating till the end. I found the suggestion a good and feasible one! From September 14-18 I dedicated some time in my daily running routine for run-walk sequences to get accustomed to that kind of running. 

September 18 was my final practice day and I was completely ready for the action...I will stop here and cover my actual experience of running my first FM my next article. Before concluding, I would like to highlight on my diet and injuries I faced during my FM practice. 

Diet

The diet during my practice days was normal. Since I was staying alone, I used to cook two meals on my own so that I don't get tummy upsets because of eating outside. I stayed away from Junk foods and Ice-creams entirely during my practice period. I wanted to make sure I am completely healthy and not affected by common illnesses like cough, cold and fever. My daily intake had a compulsory glass of tender coconut water, 2-3 glasses of butter milk and occasional servings of fruit juices to keep myself hydrated enough. 

Injuries

Even before I started my practice in June 2015, I had started getting pain in my right foot mainly in the heel and ankle region. My physio suggested me to wear silicone insoles in the shoes to give my heels an extra level of cushioning. I ordered a pair online and found them useful. But despite that, after each weekend run, I had to be on the clinic bed getting Interferential Therapy (IFT) for the lower part of my right leg. 

On the Independence day sale of that year, I got a chance to try out a pair running shoes from brand Skechers in one of the popular footwear showrooms of Mysore. I found the soles of those shoes very soft and gentle on my toes and heels. I didn't think twice before buying a pair as it was coming with 50% discount. Since then I prefer to wear shoes of brand Skechers for long distance running. 

Before the event I bought a fresh set of running accessories - head band, a pair of wrist bands, a pair of socks meant for long running, shorts and inner wear made of technical fabric. 

I hope you found this article useful. Thanks a lot for reading and encouraging...

Regards,

Chetan